Few of us ever live in the present. We
are forever anticipating what is to come or remembering what has gone.
Louis L’Amour
You will make sense of your life when you start
living each day in the present. Many people regret the present moment and yearn
for the past or future. They either live in the past, wishing they could turn
back the hands of time, or they spend their time wishing for a better life in
the future.
Paulo
Coelho describes the problem beautifully: “We have enormous difficulty in
focusing on the present; we're always thinking about what we did, about how we
could have done it better, about the consequences of our actions, and about why
we didn't act as we should have. Or else, we think about the future, about what
we're going to do tomorrow, what precautions we should take, what dangers await
us around the next corner, how to avoid what we don't want and how to get what
we have always dreamed of.”
Are you living in the past or are you waiting in great anticipation for your future? What about now? Isn’t the present moment important, too? According to Mahatma Gandhi, “The future depends on what you do today.” Yes! Every thought, decision, and action today impact your present and your future. Are you focused on the here and now?
You
alone have the power to make good or bad decisions.
Your decisions in life are influenced by the present
moment and the people who are with you at the time. You have to decide who or
what it is that is guiding you to make your decisions because the decisions
that you make affect your plans and your mood. They determine whether you will
be happy or disappointed. If you make bad decisions, you will experience
negative outcomes, but good decisions will lead to a successful future.
How do you make decisions? Do you make decisions independently
or do you allow others to help you? Do you make decisions that are best for you
or do you make decisions that are best for others? Do you fear that every
decision you make may be a wrong decision? Do you prefer not to make decisions
at all and allow them to be made for you?
Every
moment of your life defines you.
You are who you are in each moment. The decisions
that you make may stretch across many moments, but the minute you make the
decision you create a new direction. Even when the decision turns out to have
been a mistake, and the outcome is negative, it doesn’t have to stay that way.
You may have taken a wrong direction, but it’s a learning process. You can turn
it around.
At some point in the future, you may discover that a
choice you had made in the past is not what you planned or wanted. You needn’t
regret it, though. Don’t focus on the choice as a mistake and don’t dwell on
the time that’s been lost. Focus on the process of learning that came from the
experience. You have grown because of it. If you never make mistakes, how will
you ever learn or change?
Choices
always lead to new opportunities.
Your decisions can be average and ordinary or they
can be life-changing. Joel Osteen said, “If you think you’re average, then
you’ll be average. If you think you’re ordinary, then you’ll live ordinary. The
truth is there is nothing ordinary about you. You have something to offer that
nobody else can offer.” Do you think that you’re just an average person?
Genesis 1:26 (ESV)
reads: “Then God said, ‘Let
us make man in our image, after our likeness”. Yes! You have been made
according to God’s likeness. Do you still think you’re average?
The way you think defines you. You can’t have a
successful future if you think you’re average. You can’t have a successful
future if you don’t know why you’re here. You can’t have a successful future if
you don’t plan ahead. If you want to have freedom and money one day, so that
you can lead a successful life, you’ll also need to know what success means.
